Innovation Economics · Institutional overlap
The Triple Helix.
Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff: innovation emerges from the interaction of three institutional spheres — universities, industry, and government — each taking on roles traditionally held by the others. Universities commercialise. Firms do basic research. Governments take equity stakes. The model describes Silicon Valley, Cambridge UK, and Israel's tech ecosystem better than older linear models did. The interesting work happens in the overlaps; the centre is the rarest and most productive intersection.
The thesis
Triple Helix is operationally useful because it points to specific intervention levers: technology-transfer offices, sovereign innovation funds, university-affiliated incubators, mission-oriented public procurement. It can also produce concentrated outcomes if the helix is geographically narrow — one university region, one industry cluster, one tier of government. Broadening it across provinces, across historically disadvantaged universities, across both formal and informal sectors is itself a distributional choice. The question for any board engaging with university partnerships is which institutions and which geographies are inside the helix — and which are outside.